Jul 31, 2012

Finally having reached Ithiss-Tor, Sirantha must complete her diplomatic mission to save humanity from the impending Morgut invasion, but her complex political position is only further compounded by her lover's decline into a dark psychosis.

My Review:

This, the third novel in this series is fun, while not as prone to random plot whorls as it's previous two, and has a mix of diplomacy, mystery, romance, and action.

Ms Aguirre manages to create a love story in these novels that is strong enough to get over itself. Nothing in these books have been about the main character's love interest being the thing that defines her or the singular thing that drives her. In fact, it ends up being the first thing she has to sacrifice in many cases. And yet, she and March are mature enough and level headed enough that they can get over themselves and deal with the problems at hand and then find a way to return to what they are/what they had.

To be honest, I was a little worried about this novel's plot. Political intrigue can be and a tricky thing to pull off well, and I wasn't sure what to expect, especially with a main character as vocal about her ineptitude with this sort of thing as Sirantha is. But she did it very well. The amount of help that Sirantha receives seems like the amount she'd need to perform in her task. And overall, this very alien situation came across feeling very real.

Buy, Borrow, Brush Past:

I'd give this novel a solid Buy. Like the first two in the series Ms. Aguirre manages to hold you attention and lead you to places you don't expect.

Jul 26, 2012

This Week has been a rather slow progression. But I've got a pretty good system down. From 8 to 9, I write out chapter maps for what I plan to write for the day. And then I have an hourly word count to meet. It's actually been working out quite well. And hopefully that holds up.

So, each morning I look to my outline (which usually has about 3 words describing the general issue in that chapter) and then I slowly build up to a more substantial count.

This week's writing...

With as slow as the writing has gone, I only just got back to doing any revision work yesterday. Which is why last week saw 382 pages edited.. and this week I get a paltry 60. But that's okay. I had time for Novel 5 to marinate up in my brain pan and that is always a good thin. Especially since something came up at work that totally needs to find it's way into that book.

This Week's Revisions:

I'm pretty sure you don't want to see my spreadsheet that catalogues how may words I want to get written/pages revised/pages read/blog posts written... You might get tired just looking at it. (I'm a very goal oriented person)

Jul 19, 2012

To be honest, I'm a little disappointed in this week's progress. I probably shouldn't be. I only missed my word count goal yesterday... and I'm a day ahead on my revisions... but still. It irks me.

Here are the charts!

Revisions:

I had people waiting on the first revision (and this is the 8th? time we've gone through that one, so it's mostly just little formatting/grammatical issues that pop up) The other two aren't as far along, so they'll take longer.

Writing:

You'll notice I've only got one novel on my plate for this month, that's because it's a first draft that I was starting pretty much from scratch. It's an idea I've had bouncing about in my brainpan for a good long while, and I decided this was the time to get it done!

Jul 17, 2012

Devin Guthrie has three major problems. The first is that his parents are pushing him into marriage. The second, is that his nephew trip has grand schemes of joining up with Uncle Phillip’s rebel forces and has run away. The third is that in finding his nephew, he winds up in close quarters with the woman he really loves, a woman who, by all of his family standards is a terrible match.

My Review:

The plot in this book seems a little too heavy for the book, and it ends pretty open. I think both of these things can be explained by the fact that there was supposed to be a fifth book that ended up being scrapped – which I think is a terrible thing, because this series had the potential for an amazing finale.

As with the third book in this novel set, I find the relationship to be strongly crafted and completely realistic. The hero is very much the beta male, which I find an interesting departure from the majority of Sinclair’s books, but it works with the set up of the Guthrie family in the first three books.

Buy, Borrow, Brush Past:

Even though this ends with a clear next-book-lead-in, I think the story as-is is entertaining enough to warrant a read. I’d give this a BUY, especially if you’ve read the first three books in the series.

Jul 9, 2012

This picture (of Northern Arizona) is an ispiration for the novel I plan to finish in October (Novel #10!) and all this week I've had a song that inspires me to work on it playing - this means there's been lots of notes.

Jul 5, 2012

This week has been all kinds of whack-a-doodle. What with the holiday yesterday and just life in general, but I’ve managed to stay on track, and better yet, get ahead! (Though to be fair, I was rather lenient in my word count requirements for these two novels.)

Tuesday, I finished the rewrite of Draft 6 for Novel 5! Which is awesome (even though, that night as I was doing dishes I realized something I’d forgotten and need to work in when I go back through it AGAIN.

And now I have just over 8k-words left to go with Draft 1 Novel 7! So I anticipate having more completion news for you next week!

Much more somber than the series first three installments, this book continues with Koch’s normal plot structure with a major climax 3/4 through the book and then a final battle/event to cap it all off. At least it’s consistent.

The novel does introduce my two favorite pairings of the series so far, one romantic and one professional – though it does involve Kitty, so there’s always some flirting involved.

There is an event that occurs that strives to level the playing field for kitty (and while it doesn’t, I have to wonder what the point of it was. It fell flat for me.

Buy, Borrow, Brush Past:

At this point I think if you’re invested in the series, keep buying them, but if you’re not terribly smitten by the first three, this one probably won’t hold your fancy.